Oddbean

I have one mini PC that I use as a Karaoke and Dance Dance Revolution machine. I might convert it as a node, maybe I could even run the games from time to time without slowing down the node in the background, double use case. What is the best way to run a node on a standard PC like this? All manual install on CLI? Run everything in Docker containers? Use a dedicated OS? Also is it possible to restore an Umbrel node with all apps and channel on the new machine or I must start from scrach with new channels and all?

I don't run a LN node anymore, but my understanding is that moving channels around gets much dicier. "Best way" to run a node will depend on tech comfort level. I suppose you could do an unlicensed Win10 install and just run the Bitcoin Core UI. Better would be either a full node packager image (I think maybe some package in their own linux OS?) or a basic debian / ubuntu install with a node packager on top (which will be all dockerized apps under the hood). I'm going more hardcore and running ProxMox to create separate baby VMs for each service to run in.

Windows is a no-go for sure, my daily PC is running Kubuntu, not the most hardcore Linux but way better than Windows and iOS. I hesistate to run Proxmox as my new NAS/home server but went for TrueNAS Scale instead, not so easy but probably easier than Proxmox. The Karaoke et dance games are running on Linux so I could go with the prebuild environnement with Docker but then what would be the advantage from my Umbrel on RasPi4? Is the power really improving the node reliability and speed? Beside the Mempool app that freeze and I need to restart every 1-2 months, it seams to be all fine, I have BTCPay Server and LNbits, Nostr Relay and couple of other apps related to Lightning.